The dust-swept Qushtapa camp in northern Iraq offers shelter to Syrian refugees but few employment or educational opportunities. So when residents heard of a program promising to turn them into employed computer programmers within eight months, they queued up to apply - TakePart

Running a Middle Eastern airport is fairly challenging at the best of times. There are the lovesick hijackers and the irate music legends; the rogue sons of ministers who force the return of departed planes after they’ve arrived late to the gate.

But for Erbil International Airport the last few years have presented a series of unique problems - Quartz

Chad Martin, a ruddy-faced 22-year-old American, is driving a pickup truck through the rubble-strewn streets of Sinjar, Iraq. Riding shotgun next to him is Eric Detweiler, also 22, from Colon, Michigan.

But they aren't soldiers, or private military contractors, or even civilians who have come to war-ravaged northern Iraq to take part in the fight against Islamic State, as dozens of others have done - Vice News